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I've also heard a similar story of a Finnish man who got a ticket in the UK, and on closer inspection found his name on the ticket listed as Mr. Ajokortti Körko

I've also heard a similar story of a Finnish man who got a ticket in the UK, and on closer inspection found his name on the ticket listed as Mr. Ajokortti Körkort. Thats "driver's licence", first in Finnish, then Swedish, and is written at the top of the driver's license card. That said, I find these stories a little hard to credit, since you'd expect police officers in the EU to be fairly familiar with the standard EU driver's license layout.

LanceH 7y ago
I've been at some tournaments where a couple of the kids had the last name "Bye". They picked up a fair number of forfeits during the season.
- p1esk 7y ago
  Wow, that's an awesome last name for a tennis player :)
  - LanceH 7y ago
    NASCAR -- have your name on the rear bumper.
diatribattical 7y ago
I once had a BevMo cashier in California ask me, “Massachusetts? Is that in Canada?” Very little faith left.
- impeachTheIdiot 7y ago
  Yea, but it’s understandable an America sucks a geography (what do you expect with a shit education system). I expect better from the EU.
- madcaptenor 7y ago
  I once had a cab driver take me to MIT. Cab driver: "what is this place?" Me: "MIT" Cab driver: "what's MIT?" Me: "the Massachusetts Institute of Technology." Cab driver: "what's Massachusetts?"
  - foldr 7y ago
    I had a cab driver in New York who was unable to take me to the Brooklyn Bridge.
    - neffy 7y ago
      ... well it keeps getting sold.
    - et2o 7y ago
      Possibly didn't want to take you into Brooklyn. The Manhattan side isn't really walkable.
      - foldr 7y ago
        I was already on the Brooklyn side. But the issue was literally that he had no idea what the Brooklyn Bridge was, not the precise drop-off location. (We just wanted to look around Dumbo for a bit.)
        et2o 7y ago
        Wow! Hard to think of a more iconic landmark in that case.
        madcaptenor 7y ago
        Someone else is probably out there complaining a cab driver wouldn't give them a ride to the Statue of Liberty.
  - james_s_tayler 7y ago
    Not to be confused with the world class educational institution the Manukau Institute of Technology :P I always find it funny when I drive by that and I see the sign MIT.
dmurray 7y ago
Irish driving licences didn't start to use the standard credit-card-sized EU format until a few years ago. They were paper booklets which had long since been phased out in the rest of Europe.
- roelschroeven 7y ago
  Here in Belgium new driving licenses are of the standard credit-card design (I don't know exactly since when), but most people still have the old folded paper design. Since the old licenses are still valid, and the new designs require renewal every 5 years which the old ones don't, there is no incentive for people to swap their old license for a new one.
mikeash 7y ago
You’d expect offices in the US to be familiar with US states and territories, but that doesn’t stop them from occasionally demanding a passport from people from New Mexico, or saying a license is fake because there’s no such state as “District of Columbia.”
- zxcvbn4038 7y ago
  I once had a Texas policemen unholster his pistol on me because he thought my US Passport was a fake ID and my travelers checks were some sort of scam. Then his backup arrived and explained both items to him — and the Dairy Queen cashier that had called 911 on me. Stuff like that is why you have to stay on the interstate.
  - atm0sphere 7y ago
    can you elaborate on this story? why the hell did the cashier call 911 on you, and what state were you from? how long ago was this?
    - 0xffff2 7y ago
      Based on "traveler's checks", I'm going to guess at least a couple decades ago. Cashier probably called 911 because they thought GP was trying to commit fraud with "fake money".
      - megaremote 7y ago
        I mean, in what world can you cash travelers cheques at a dairy queen?
        zxcvbn4038 7y ago
        Dairy Queen was a favorite from my childhood, I had moved away from Texas years earlier so I decided to indulge while visiting. These days I’m more into Sonic - the food is better, they have a greater variety of sweet treats, and I really like their iOS app.
hansjorg 7y ago
> you'd expect police officers in the EU to be fairly familiar with the standard EU driver's license layout The common design for all the EEA countries was supposed to be implemented by the members by the start of 2013 according to Wikipedia. Until 2033 there will be valid licenses that were issued before the common license, so there's still a lot of different designs out there.
- tialaramex 7y ago
  Also, the common design, like with passports, provides numbers for the boxes, so e.g. 1 is "Name" and 2 is "First Name" and 5 is your license number with whichever authority issued the license. But it doesn't take a _very_ stupid person to write down stuff that's in the wrong box or not in a box at all when all of it seems like moon language to you. Probably better to have a machine scan the identity document, not least because the machine can trivially avoid freaking out over "Nick Smith, born 2000-01-04" when the wanted criminal was actually "Mick Smith, born 2000-04-01".

LanceH 7y ago

I've been at some tournaments where a couple of the kids had the last name "Bye". They picked up a fair number of forfeits during the season.

p1esk 7y ago
Wow, that's an awesome last name for a tennis player :)
- LanceH 7y ago
  NASCAR -- have your name on the rear bumper.

diatribattical 7y ago

I once had a BevMo cashier in California ask me, “Massachusetts? Is that in Canada?” Very little faith left.

impeachTheIdiot 7y ago
Yea, but it’s understandable an America sucks a geography (what do you expect with a shit education system). I expect better from the EU.
madcaptenor 7y ago
I once had a cab driver take me to MIT. Cab driver: "what is this place?" Me: "MIT" Cab driver: "what's MIT?" Me: "the Massachusetts Institute of Technology." Cab driver: "what's Massachusetts?"
- foldr 7y ago
  I had a cab driver in New York who was unable to take me to the Brooklyn Bridge.
  - neffy 7y ago
    ... well it keeps getting sold.
  - et2o 7y ago
    Possibly didn't want to take you into Brooklyn. The Manhattan side isn't really walkable.
    - foldr 7y ago
      I was already on the Brooklyn side. But the issue was literally that he had no idea what the Brooklyn Bridge was, not the precise drop-off location. (We just wanted to look around Dumbo for a bit.)
      - et2o 7y ago
        Wow! Hard to think of a more iconic landmark in that case.
        madcaptenor 7y ago
        Someone else is probably out there complaining a cab driver wouldn't give them a ride to the Statue of Liberty.
- james_s_tayler 7y ago
  Not to be confused with the world class educational institution the Manukau Institute of Technology :P I always find it funny when I drive by that and I see the sign MIT.

dmurray 7y ago

Irish driving licences didn't start to use the standard credit-card-sized EU format until a few years ago. They were paper booklets which had long since been phased out in the rest of Europe.

roelschroeven 7y ago
Here in Belgium new driving licenses are of the standard credit-card design (I don't know exactly since when), but most people still have the old folded paper design. Since the old licenses are still valid, and the new designs require renewal every 5 years which the old ones don't, there is no incentive for people to swap their old license for a new one.

mikeash 7y ago

You’d expect offices in the US to be familiar with US states and territories, but that doesn’t stop them from occasionally demanding a passport from people from New Mexico, or saying a license is fake because there’s no such state as “District of Columbia.”

zxcvbn4038 7y ago
I once had a Texas policemen unholster his pistol on me because he thought my US Passport was a fake ID and my travelers checks were some sort of scam. Then his backup arrived and explained both items to him — and the Dairy Queen cashier that had called 911 on me. Stuff like that is why you have to stay on the interstate.
- atm0sphere 7y ago
  can you elaborate on this story? why the hell did the cashier call 911 on you, and what state were you from? how long ago was this?
  - 0xffff2 7y ago
    Based on "traveler's checks", I'm going to guess at least a couple decades ago. Cashier probably called 911 because they thought GP was trying to commit fraud with "fake money".
    - megaremote 7y ago
      I mean, in what world can you cash travelers cheques at a dairy queen?
      - zxcvbn4038 7y ago
        Dairy Queen was a favorite from my childhood, I had moved away from Texas years earlier so I decided to indulge while visiting. These days I’m more into Sonic - the food is better, they have a greater variety of sweet treats, and I really like their iOS app.

hansjorg 7y ago

> you'd expect police officers in the EU to be fairly familiar with the standard EU driver's license layout The common design for all the EEA countries was supposed to be implemented by the members by the start of 2013 according to Wikipedia. Until 2033 there will be valid licenses that were issued before the common license, so there's still a lot of different designs out there.

tialaramex 7y ago
Also, the common design, like with passports, provides numbers for the boxes, so e.g. 1 is "Name" and 2 is "First Name" and 5 is your license number with whichever authority issued the license. But it doesn't take a _very_ stupid person to write down stuff that's in the wrong box or not in a box at all when all of it seems like moon language to you. Probably better to have a machine scan the identity document, not least because the machine can trivially avoid freaking out over "Nick Smith, born 2000-01-04" when the wanted criminal was actually "Mick Smith, born 2000-04-01".